WELL WISHING

Is there anyone as hopelessly optimistic as a gardener? This question coming from Mrs. Skeptical, Logical, Plan-For-The-Worst? But, that's the human, female part of me. It's the non-gender-related gardening side of me holds more positive wishes for the future.

Why then would I lament and scorn the heat and humidity of summer each morning as I lug around the hose; shake my fist at the ever-voracious, nibbling voles who suck down plants overnight leaving only a gaping hole where once stood that plant and yet just as that hungry vole, I'll eagerly devour the first garden catalog which has already found its way into my mailbox. The bulb catalogs. Bulbs to be planted in the fall for late winter, spring and summer bloom.

You see, this way I reap the benefits of both my logical self my gardening self. (As any gardener knows, Gardening" and "Logic" are oxymorons when used in the same sentence. One doesn't garden because it's logical. It's fraught with illogic and contradictions. Nor does logic ever propel a person into gardening. After all, only Mad Dogs and Englishmen ...and gardeners go out in the midday sun to water a pot of parched petunias at the end of the driveway.)

My logical self tells me if I plan my bulb display now and place my orders early, I'll get what I want and achieve (with the squirrels', rabbits' and deer's cooperation) the look I want. My gardening self tells me...if I plan my bulb display now and place my orders, I'm apparently casting my hopes into that little wishing well of mine in my shade garden or that "Big" wishing well in the deepest recesses of my brain, that I'll be around next spring and summer to see that display.

"Wishing and hoping and planning...." Lyrics from an old Dusty Springfield song and music to a gardener's ears.